Rollo in Naples Part 15

"I did it partly by signs," said Rollo.

The road to Pompeii, for the first few miles, was the same with the one to Vesuvius, which they had taken the day before. It led first through the busiest part of Naples, along by the docks and the s.h.i.+pping, and then through the series of towns and villages which line the sh.o.r.e of the bay, at the foot of the slopes of Vesuvius. After pa.s.sing in this manner through one continued street for five or six miles, the road came out more into the open country, where fine views were had of the mountain on one side, and of the bay on the other. The mountain sides were generally extremely fertile, being covered with vineyards and groves, though here and there were to be seen the streams of lava which had come down within a few hundred years, and which had not yet become disintegrated and converted into soil. These streams of lava looked like torrents of brown water suddenly turned into stone, as they came streaming down the mountain side.

In one place, one of these streams of lava pa.s.sed under a town. That is to say, such was the appearance. The fact was, really, that the lava had destroyed the part of the town that came in its way, and the people had built up their houses again on the top of it. The lava was cut down a little in making the road, so that you could see at the road side a portion of the stream, with the houses upon it.

After riding on in this way two or three hours, the carriage stopped at a very pleasant place, among vineyards and mulberry groves, at the entrance of a pretty lane, which led to the gates of Pompeii.

"Now," said Rosie, "our difficulties are going to begin. I don't see how we are going to know where to look for Mr. George."

"We will see," said Mrs. Gray.

The coachman opened the door, and all the party got out. Just then they saw at a short distance before them, where there was a sort of gate, several men in a species of uniform, which denoted that they were the persons appointed by the government to take charge of the place, and to show it to visitors. One of these men, as soon as he saw the party, seemed to look very much pleased, and he advanced to meet them with a smiling face. At the same time he said something to a boy who was near by, and the boy ran off into the town. The young man in uniform, when he came near to Mrs. Gray, said something which at first she could not understand, but which she soon perceived was an attempt to p.r.o.nounce the words, _Il Signore Holiday_.

"Ah! he has seen Mr. George," said Mrs. Gray. "Mr. George has been here, and has told him to watch for us."

This supposition on the part of Mrs. Gray was correct. Mr. George had come early with the students to Pompeii, in order to be ready there to receive Mrs. Gray and her party, and he had stationed this man at the gate to watch for them, with directions to send the boy in for him at an appointed place, as soon as they should arrive. The boy soon found Mr.

George, and he came immediately back to the gate. Of course the whole party were very much pleased to see him.

"And yet," said Mrs. Gray, "Rollo has managed so well that I should not have felt any anxiety if we had continued under his sole charge all day."

The party now commenced their exploration of Pompeii. They found it, as they had expected, all open to the day. A great many of the streets, with all the houses bordering them, had been cleared, and all the sand and gravel under which they had been buried had been carted away.

Immense heaps of this rubbish were lying outside the entrance, and the party had pa.s.sed them in the carriage on their approach to the town.

They had been lying there so long, however, that they were covered with gra.s.s and small trees, and they looked like great railroad embankments.

Indeed, the appearance which Pompeii presents now is that of a large open village of ruined and roofless one-storied houses. Many of the houses were originally two stories high, it is true; but the upper stories have been destroyed or shaken down, and in general it is the lower story only that now remains.

The structure of the houses, in respect to plan and general arrangement, is very different from that of the dwellings built in our towns at the present day. The chief reasons for the difference arise from the absence of windows and chimneys in the houses of the ancients, and of course the leaving out of windows and chimneys in a house makes it necessary to change every thing.

The inhabitants of Pompeii had no chimneys, because the climate there is so mild that they seldom needed a fire; and when they did need one, it was easier to make a small one in an open vessel, and let it stand in the middle of the room, or wherever it was required, than to make a chimney and a fireplace. The open pan in which the fires were made in those days stood on legs, and could be moved about any where. The fire was made of small twigs cut from the trees. The people would let the pan stand in the open air until the twigs were burnt to coal, and then they would carry the pan, with the embers still glowing, into the room which they wished to warm, and place it wherever it was required.

The same contrivance is used at the present day in Naples, and in all the towns of that region. In going along the streets in a cool evening or morning, you will often see one of these bra.s.s pans before a door, with a little fire blazing in it, and children or other persons before it, warming their hands. Afterwards, if you watch, you will see that the people take it into the house.

The ancient inhabitants of Pompeii depended entirely on arrangements like these for warming their rooms. There is not a chimney to be found in the whole town.

In respect to windows, the reason why they did not have them was because they had no gla.s.s to put into them. They could not make gla.s.s in those days well enough and easily enough to use it for windows. Of course they had openings in their houses to admit the air and the light, and these openings might perhaps be called windows. But in order to prevent the wind and rain from coming in, it was necessary to have them placed in sheltered situations, as, for example, under porticos and piazzas. The custom therefore arose of having a great many porticos in the houses, with rooms opening from them; and in order that they might not be too much exposed, they were generally made so as to have the open side of them inwards, towards the centre of the house, where a small, square place was left, without a roof over it, to admit the light and air.

Of course the rain would come in through this open s.p.a.ce, and the floor of it was generally formed into a square marble basin, to receive the water. This was called the _impluvium_. Sometimes there was a fountain in the centre of the impluvium, and all around it were the porticos, within and under which were the doors opening into the different rooms.

The guide, who conducted Mr. George and his party, led them into several of these houses, and every one was much interested in examining the arrangement of the rooms, and in imagining how the people looked in going in and out, and in living in them. The bed rooms were extremely small. The walls of some of them were beautifully painted, but the rooms themselves were often not much bigger than a state room in a steams.h.i.+p.

The bedstead was a sort of berth, formed upon a marble shelf built across from wall to wall.

In some of the houses there were more rooms than could be arranged around one court; and in such cases there were two, and sometimes three courts. In one case, the third court was a garden, with a beautiful portico formed of ornamental columns all around it. Beneath this portico the ladies of the house, in rainy weather, could walk at their ease, and see the flowers growing in the garden, just as well as if the weather were fair.

Under this portico, all around, was a subterranean chamber, which seemed to be used as a sort of cellar. And yet it was very neatly finished, and the walls of it were ornamented in such a way as to lead people to suppose that it might have been used as a cool walk in warm weather.

This pa.s.sage way was first discovered by means of the steps leading down to it. It was almost full of earth, which earth consisted of volcanic sand and ashes, which had flowed into it in the form of mud.

On one side of this subterranean pa.s.sage way, near the entrance, there were a number of skeletons found. These skeletons were in a standing position against the wall, where the persons had been stopped and buried up by the mud as it flowed in. The marks left by the bodies against the wall remain to this day, and Rollo and all the party saw them.

One of the skeletons was that of a female, and there were a great many rings on the fingers of the hands, and bracelets, necklaces, and other ornaments on the other bones. From this circ.u.mstance it is supposed that this person was the wife of the owner of the house, and that in trying to save herself and her jewelry upon her, she had fled with the servants to this cellar, and there had been overwhelmed.

There were very few skeletons found in the houses of Pompeii; from which circ.u.mstance it is supposed that the inhabitants generally had time to escape. There was, however, one remarkable case. It was that of a sentinel in his sentry box, at the gate of the city. He would not leave his post, as it would seem, and so perished at the station where he had been placed. His head, with the helmet still upon it, was carried to the museum at Naples, where it is now seen by all the world, and every one who sees it utters some expression of praise for the courage and fidelity which the poor fellow displayed in fulfilling his trust.

The streets of the town were narrow, but they were paved substantially with large and solid stones, flat at the top. Along these streets there were a great many very curious shops, such as barbers' shops, painters'

shops, wine shops, and the like. The wine shops were furnished with deep jars set in a sort of stone counter. The jars were open-mouthed, and the men who kept the shops were accustomed apparently to dip the wine out of them, in selling to their customers.

After pa.s.sing through a number of these streets, the party came at length to a great public square called the _Forum_. This square was surrounded with the ruins of temples, and other great public edifices.

The columns and porticos which bordered the square are all now more or less in ruins; but there are still so many of them standing as to show exactly what the forms of the buildings must have been when they were complete, and how the square must have appeared.

In another part of the town were the remains of two theatres, and outside the walls an immense amphitheatre, where were exhibited the combats of wild beasts, and those of the gladiators. There are a great many ruins of amphitheatres like this scattered over Italy. They are of an oval form, and the seats extend all around. The place where the combats took place was a level spot in the centre, called the _arena_.

In viewing these various ruins, Mr. George and the two students seemed most interested in the theatres, and temples, and other great public edifices, while Mrs. Gray and the children seemed to think a great deal more of the houses and the shops. There was one baker's shop with the oven entire, and three stone hand mills, in which the baker used to grind his corn. There were a great many curious utensils and implements found in this shop, when it was first excavated; but Mr. George said that they had all been removed.

"I wish they had let them stay here," said Rollo.

"It would be a great deal more interesting to us to see them here," said Mr. George, "but they would not have been safe. The government has therefore built an immense museum at Naples, and every thing that is movable has been carried there. So we come here first to see the town and the remains of the shops and the houses, and then afterwards we go to the museum at Naples to see the things that were found in them."

After rambling about in Pompeii for several hours, the party went out by another gate, where they found the carriage waiting for them, and so returned home.

CHAPTER IX.

THE MUSEUM.

The great museum at Naples is one of the most wonderful collections of curiosities in the world. It is contained in an immense building, which is divided into numerous galleries and halls, each of which is devoted to some special department of art.

It was the plan of our party to go and see the museum on the day after their visit to Pompeii,--or rather to begin to see it; for it requires a great deal more than one day even to walk cursorily through the rooms.

On the morning of the day in question, Mrs. Gray said to Mr. George, at breakfast, that she had a plan to propose.

"What is it?" asked Mr. George.

"I am afraid that you will not think it very polite in me to propose it," said Mrs. Gray, "but it is this: that when we get into the museum, we should divide into two parties. Let Rollo go with me and the children, while you join your friends the students, and accompany them.

Then we can go through the rooms in our way, and you can go in yours."

Mr. George hesitated. For a moment he seemed not to know what to reply to this proposal.

"The reason is," said Mrs. Gray, "that the objects which you and the students will have in view in the visit, may very likely be different from ours. You will want to study the antiquities, and the old Latin and Greek inscriptions, and the monuments ill.u.s.trating ancient history; but we should not understand such things. We shall be interested in the paintings, and the rings, and jewels, and ornaments found in Pompeii, and in the household implements and utensils."

"But we shall want to see all those things, too," said Mr. George.

"True," replied Mrs. Gray; "but you will not wish to devote so great a portion of time to them. You will wish to devote most of your time to the learned things, and will pa.s.s rapidly over the pretty things and the curious things, while with us it will be just the other way."

"Yes, uncle George," said Rollo, "that will be the best plan. Josie and I can take care of Mrs. Gray, and you can go where you please."